Brief history of the country

Bhutan (the Kingdom of Bhutan) is a land-locked country at the eastern end of the Himalayas. It borders China (north) and India to the south (West Bengal and Assam), east (Arunachal Pradesh) and west (Sikkim).

Evidence for inhabitants in Bhutan date from over 3000 years ago. After 600 AD Buddhism was introduced and numerous religious sects vied with each other under Mongol and Tibetan leaders. However, early history is unclear because records were lost when fire destroyed the ancient capital of Punakha in 1827.

Early in the 1600s the country was unified by a Tibetan lama who built a network of dzongs (fortresses) and established a Bhutanese identity. Bhutan defended itself from the Mughal Empire in the 18th century and repeatedly attacked British India until a final peace treaty was signed in 1865.

Civil war between the valleys of Paro and Tongsa then led to victory for Ugyen Wangchuck of Tongsa. In 1907 he became king who, in 1910, signed the Treaty of Punakha giving the UK control of foreign affairs, continued by India after independence in 1947.

The economy depends on agriculture and the sale of hydroelectricity to India (since 2007). It has also seen recent growth in its technology sector. Now beginning to modernise, it only allowed television in the country in 1999.

Oil and gas summary

Land-locked Bhutan is located on the southern slopes of the eastern Himalayas and consists mostly of high mountains, forested slopes, and a network of steep rivers in deep valleys. Elevation rises from 200m in the southern foothills to more than 7,000m with the highest point being Gangkhar Puensum at 7,570m.

Bhutan is entirely within the eastern Himalayas mountain range. The Himalayas represent the folded and thrusted remains of deposits within the Tethyan ocean, that lay between the Eurasian plate and the Indo-Australian plate. These are combined with Precambrian and Palaeozoic basement rocks of the southern edge of the Tibetan block of Eurasia.

Collision began about 65 million years ago at which time oceanic crust began to subduct and then thrust over the Tibetan block to produce the complex tectonics of the mountain range we see today.

The Indian plate continues to be driven below the Tibetan Plateau, which is forcing the mountains higher and the plateau upwards.

Like Nepal the country has no identified indigenous oil or gas resources owing to its location within the Himalayas where sediments are uplifted and highly deformed with limited young sedimentary cover.

Bhutan has no history of oil or gas production and no exploration wells have ever been drilled within its entirely mountainous terrain. Globalshift does not forecast any future production of oil or gas from the country.

Government

Bhutan is a constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary government. The King is head of state who delegated absolute powers to parliament in 2008 when the first election was held.

The bicameral parliament consists of a 25-member National Council, led by the Prime minister and a 47-member National Assembly.

The Department of Geology and Mines was established in 1981 to oversee exploration but no department is specifically responsible for oil and gas resources.

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